Premier League 2019-2020 Thread

[hippo]

1 hour ago, Demitri_C said:

I wonder. How Smith will approach the PL. We can't just attack attack attack here like we did in championship . We try that at City or Liverpool they will absolutely murder us. 

I think we do need to attack more but I think we have to be solid with our passing and hold the ball better than we have done at times.. 

Looking at the teams you would think relegation candidates in the mix will sadly be us Norwich sheff United Brighton Palace maybe Newcastle if they don't get sold and possibly Burnley or Bournemouth 

 

This crossed my mind - but Smith has proved he can adapt - and he learns.

[BOF]

1 hour ago, Demitri_C said:

I wonder. How Smith will approach the PL. We can't just attack attack attack here like we did in championship . We try that at City or Liverpool they will absolutely murder us. 

I think we do need to attack more but I think we have to be solid with our passing and hold the ball better than we have done at times.. 

Looking at the teams you would think relegation candidates in the mix will sadly be us Norwich sheff United Brighton Palace maybe Newcastle if they don't get sold and possibly Burnley or Bournemouth

What you say is true, but Smith isn't an idiot, and Wolves have shown you don't need to be fearful when you go up, so it's not like being a Huddersfield or a Cardiff and clinging on for dear life while doing a whistlestop tour of the grounds.  I think we'll have a go at teams far more than most do, but then as Sky have said, we are no ordinary playoff winner.  This is order restored. The investment will show that we're here to stay, which will make it much more possible to be competitive.  I also think John Terry; as useful as he was last season; will be even more important this season because now his knowledge and success at the top level is something Smith can lean on even more.

[thejoker]

10 hours ago, briny_ear said:

Funnily enough, I saw his name mentioned for absolutely no discernible reason just recently,

some poster called @thejoker if I recall correctly. 

Touché 

[Teale's 'tache]

For me 17th will do just fine, an extra season in the Prem gives us another £100m, another year to get the deadwood out of the squad and big wages off the books, then with a more settled team/squad we can really invest.

We have to be wary of a worst case scenario, it would be bad management of the club not to. We can't just sign whoever we want on whatever wages, we need to be smarter than that. I love that the club is so positive, manager, players, fans, owners, but we have to be aware of the ramifications if we were to go down again.

I like the way we play on the front foot, I like that we are a team that is willing to take a risk, it could work in our favour and bring us some wins from unlikely places/positions, at the same time we might get a bloodied nose from a few. We need to keep calm heads and roll with those punches.

It's going to be a hard slog, we are going to have to integrate a lot of new players and at the same time hit the ground running. We can't afford many bad signings, how we invest in the summer is vital.

There is potential that we can do better than 17th no doubt, but we aren't Wolves, they were in a more settled position, they kept all of their players and added where needed, not the wholesale changes we require, and they can attract players others can't because of their links with Mendes.

I think 40 points should be our target and anything else is a bonus.

 

 

[Vive_La_Villa]

3 hours ago, Demitri_C said:

I wonder. How Smith will approach the PL. We can't just attack attack attack here like we did in championship . We try that at City or Liverpool they will absolutely murder us. 

I think we do need to attack more but I think we have to be solid with our passing and hold the ball better than we have done at times.. 

Looking at the teams you would think relegation candidates in the mix will sadly be us Norwich sheff United Brighton Palace maybe Newcastle if they don't get sold and possibly Burnley or Bournemouth 

 

Did we even do this? I watched a team that defended together as a unit when didn’t have the ball and kept it well when they did. 

We wont have as much of the ball against top teams and the emphasis will be on a counter attacking style. But this idea that we play ‘attack’ ‘attack’  ‘attack’ is not accurate in my opinion.  

[Demitri_C]

9 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

Did we even do this? I watched a team that defended together as a unit when didn’t have the ball and kept it well when they did. 

We wont have as much of the ball against top teams and the emphasis will be on a counter attacking style. But this idea that we play ‘attack’ ‘attack’  ‘attack’ is not accurate in my opinion.  

Well we definitely do take the game to teams we are not a negative, overly defensive team. We like to get tnw bll foward alot. I think we are every attack minded personally which of course isn't. A bad thing. But sometimes that won't always work. 

But I think Smith will adaptand just grow better. 

[Talldarkandransome]

3 hours ago, hippo said:

hmmmm

Either your missus has run off with another bloke - or you aren't going down the villa anymore.

 

Haha nah, the dark mistress is the championship. It was a lot shorter in my head

[terrytini]

35 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

Did we even do this? I watched a team that defended together as a unit when didn’t have the ball and kept it well when they did. 

We wont have as much of the ball against top teams and the emphasis will be on a counter attacking style. But this idea that we play ‘attack’ ‘attack’  ‘attack’ is not accurate in my opinion.  

Spot on.  Our success was actually built on a terrific defence.

12 goals Conceeded in our last 16 games, ( the majority of which were against Top 8 teams including Leeds, Norwich, Baggies and Derby twice for example).

We defended as an 11 as you said....and pretty much attacked as an 11 aswell with great ball retention when we had possession.

I am very optimistic that those qualities will serve us perfectly well in our League of 14. I’ve no concerns at all.

As for games against the Top 6, I’m looking forward to them. Those we lose, we lose, those we Win will be great fun.

Ill be happy as long as we stay up, but I’m very confident we will do more than that.

[Lichfield Dean]

2 hours ago, 8pints said:

 

Going to be interesting when we play Man City and 'Don't look back in anger hits.'

Why we insist on playing that stupid song I will never understand...

[sidcow]

Recently our company instigated permanent dress down unless you have a client meeting.

Whilst I've generally carried on as normal anyway, today I am in my full on blue shirt/claret tie combo with Villa Cuff links being flashed everyones way.   It's my work attire version of full kit winker.

Getting dogs abuse from the noses and the one Derby fan in the office can't even look at me.

I feel we are now Premier League so I need to dress accordingly though.

 

[villabromsgrove]

If we sign younger, fitter, faster, hungrier players with a bit of bulldog and terrier thrown in for good measure, we will be able to successfully press teams in their own half much more than we've done this season. We'll force mistakes and jump on them!

Dean Smith football will mean that opposition teams will not look forward to playing against us as we'll be in their faces for 90 minutes. A solid defence behind half a dozen marauding assisters and scorers will get us more than enough points.  That's the dream!

[BOF]

1 hour ago, Lichfield Dean said:

Why we insist on playing that stupid song I will never understand...

I think it's simply because the chorus is anthemic and works well with a crowd.  Plus it's a fairly iconic contemporary song that basically everyone knows the words to and is unclaimed by anyone else* so we can make it 'ours'.

 

* City can't claim every Oasis song

[Mark Albrighton]

11 minutes ago, BOF said:

I think it's simply because the chorus is anthemic and works well with a crowd.  Plus it's a fairly iconic contemporary song that basically everyone knows the words to and is unclaimed by anyone else* so we can make it 'ours'.

 

* City can't claim every Oasis song

Yep.

It of course arrived following our first away win in over a year, played over the tannoy and the Villa supporters joining in.

If people don’t like it, fair enough. But the song summed up where we were as a club, people know the words and crucially it happened naturally and spontaneously. The way football throws up these moments every now and then.

If anyone wants to suggest a more suitable song that everyone knows the words to and doesn’t have the feel of being chosen by committee, then good luck.

[romavillan]

With the right signings to let Dean Smith play how he really wants. So, high tempo, pressing high, win ball back quickly, move ball quickly, possession football.... then we'll be fine I think, we need to win 10 or 11 of our home games and pick up 10 points or so on the road to stay up. Playing Smith's way with a full house at VP will help loads in achieving that. 

[Vive_La_Villa]

3 minutes ago, romavillan said:

With the right signings to let Dean Smith play how he really wants. So, high tempo, pressing high, win ball back quickly, move ball quickly, possession football.... then we'll be fine I think, we need to win 10 or 11 of our home games and pick up 10 points or so on the road to stay up. Playing Smith's way with a full house at VP will help loads in achieving that. 

The problem is pretty much every top flight teams wants to play this way these days. Signings the right players is crucial. 

I’m looking at the job Suso did at Atletico Madrid to help get them back where they belong and hoping we can do something similar. 

Edit: relatively speaking of course. I’m not expecting us to be champions jus yet.

Edited May 29, 2019 by Vive_La_Villa

[romavillan]

4 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

The problem is pretty much every top flight teams wants to play this way these days. Signings the right players is crucial. 

I’m looking at the job Suso did at Atletico Madrid to help get them back where they belong and hoping we can do something similar. 

Edit: relatively speaking of course. I’m not expecting us to be champions jus yet.

Yes modern football is based on these principals, but there's still a few teams in the top flight who seem to be trying to hang on for dear life throughout the season. 

[spiezels]

39 minutes ago, Shropshire Lad said:

Yep.

It of course arrived following our first away win in over a year, played over the tannoy and the Villa supporters joining in.

If people don’t like it, fair enough. But the song summed up where we were as a club, people know the words and crucially it happened naturally and spontaneously. The way football throws up these moments every now and then.

If anyone wants to suggest a more suitable song that everyone knows the words to and doesn’t have the feel of being chosen by committee, then good luck.

I went through A LOT of emotions in the build up to that pen.

What a moment. 

[Sid4ever]

20 minutes ago, spiezels said:

I went through A LOT of emotions in the build up to that pen.

What a moment. 

And the bugger still didn’t smile after scoring

[mjmooney]

I'd be happy to start next season with: 

GK: Steer/Kalinic 

RB: Guilbert

CB: Tuanzebe

CB: Mings

LB: Hause/new signing

DCM: new signing

CM: Grealish

CM: McGinn

LM: El Ghazi

RM: new signing

CF: Abraham/new signing 

[Stevo985]

3 hours ago, Lichfield Dean said:

Why we insist on playing that stupid song I will never understand...

 

1 hour ago, BOF said:

I think it's simply because the chorus is anthemic and works well with a crowd.  Plus it's a fairly iconic contemporary song that basically everyone knows the words to and is unclaimed by anyone else* so we can make it 'ours'.

 

* City can't claim every Oasis song

It's played because it was played after our first away win in over a year. It was a massive sigh of relief and felt like, at the time, the bottom of the slide and the start of the climb back to where we were. I'd argue it still was even though we've had to change the manager and the owners in that time.

I love it. I don't care if it's supposedly a Man City songs. The best song/club associations aren't planned. This is a perfect example of something just happening and the club rolling with it.